


Just For Now

by lydiamrtin



Category: Orange is the New Black
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Feelings, Hate Speech, Homophobia, Hurt/Comfort, also nicky is so fucking in love with lorna its ruining my life lol pass it on, seriously guys shes really fucking worried, worried lorna
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2019-06-24 05:16:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15623367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lydiamrtin/pseuds/lydiamrtin
Summary: From a prompt I received on tumblr about Lorna worrying about Nicky when she went to medical in season 6. AKA the scene we were all robbed of, that my self-indulging ass would have written either way





	Just For Now

**Author's Note:**

> WARNING/DISCLAIMER: In this fic there are graphic descriptions of violence and homophobia, hate speech, physical abuse, the works. If that's not your cup of tea or you're just not about it, feel free to skip over the italicized part, as that is the only part of the work with graphic violence and homophobic hate speech. Anyways guys thanks so much for reading, hope you enjoy! :) Love always, Anna

Nicky wakes up with a pounding, throbbing headache, and pressure all around her temples. She’s almost positive she’s concussed, and her entire body feels sore and utterly drained. 

She attempts to sit up with nothing but a surge of nausea coursing through her veins, and she wipes the sweat off her forehead only to discover that her shoulders and abdomen are also in a tremendous amount of pain. Great. 

Her eyes blink rapidly like a camera lens trying to focus on its subject. She realizes, with a pang in her chest, that this isn’t like the other times in prison where she’s detoxing and has the luxury of another’s company to hold her hair back while she throws up. This time she’s all alone. 

She remembers attempting to fend off some of the C-block girls as they swung punches at her face, but right as she caught one girl’s wrist in her hand the other one lunged at her from behind and tackled her to the ground, taking down the girl in front of her with her. 

 

______

 

_ “Bet this turns you on, doesn’t it?” the C-block girl beneath her sneers nastily, reaching up to yank a strand of Nicky’s curly hair and bringing her face even closer to hers.  _

_ “Bet this is your dirtiest, wildest fantasy come to life, isn’t it, you uglyass fucking diesel dyke.”  _

_ The girl behind her doesn’t miss a beat as she yanks Nicky by the back of her shirt to a standing position, squeezing her arms tight and locking them behind her back. Nicky thrashes in her grip, attempting to break loose and ignoring the hateful, ugly words being thrown her way, but this girl is far too strong for her. The girl in front of her steps closer, an evil glint in her eyes as she picks up a hand and caresses Nicky’s face.  _

_ “Aw, don’t be scared. We all know you love being touched by this many girls.”  _

_ Disgusted, Nicky turns her cheek away from the girl’s rough, calloused touch only to be received with laughter and a tightening of a grip from the girl behind her as a result.  _

_ “And I think we can all agree, that someone as butch as you  _ definitely _ likes it rough,” the girl behind her snarls in her ear as the girl in front of her takes no extra time to step forward and knee her directly in the crotch.  _

_ Nicky cries out in pain, falling in the girl’s grip only to be pushed back up to her feet again with sharp fingernails digging into her sides. She hears laughter coming from her right, and glances over to see Blanca being held by two other girls that are treating her equally if not exceedingly terribly.  _

_ “Hey, fuckface. Leave her out of this,” Nicky barks, voice strained from the searing pain in her crotch. “This was my idea, alright? So stop going all ballistic on her ass for something she didn’t do.”  _

_ The two other girls who were holding Blanca slacken their grip on her. “Is that true,  _ puta _?” one of them asks her snidely. “Blanca shakes her head vigorously. “No. No, it was my idea too. But I’m not even into girls. I have a boyfriend, okay?” _

_ The girls don’t seem to buy her story, especially not with the oversaturated air of desperation laced into her tone. Nicky certainly didn’t. She gives Blanca a look of defeat, a look that says, I’m sorry, I gave you an out. I can’t help you if you didn’t take it.  _

_ Next thing Nicky knows, the girl in front of her is slapping her square across the face, hard. She freezes in shock, both from the sting and the quickness of it all. Hot tears spring in her eyes, and she hangs her head as she tries to catch her breath.  _

_ “That rough enough for you yet, bitch?”  _

_ “You’re gonna have to go a little rougher than that if you want to satisfy me, you know,” Nicky seethes, white hot anger bubbling through her blood like lava in a volcano. “Cause I thought we established earlier that diesel dykes like me like it really extra rough.” She refuses to show weakness, to back down. She’ll keep her wits and sarcasm about her if she dies trying.  _

_ “Oh, is that so?” the girl behind her asks with a laugh. Before Nicky can look to see if they’ve hurt Blanca anymore, she feels herself being pushed forward by the girl behind her, and the other girl taking grip on her arms as well.  _

_ “We can get as rough as you want, you queer fucking piece of shit.”  _

_ “Y’know, for hating on people who like girls, you two seem to really enjoy touching me. Like, a lot _ ,” _ Nicky tells them pointedly, being sure to stare the bitch who slapped her in the face straight in the eye.  _

_ “You’re a funny one, aren’t you?” she retaliates in a sickly sweet high voice. Nicky feels her entire body internally cringe just from the sound of it.  _

_ The girl grabs the front of Nicky’s shirt and pulls her in, so close that their foreheads are touching. “Well, guess what? We don’t really like funny,” she says patronizingly. Her breath makes Nicky want to gag.  _

_ “Jesus Christ . . .” Nicky cringes away from her as much as she can. “Ever hear of a toothbrush? Cause I’m telling ya, they can do wonders for your dental health.”  _

_ Nicky is staring down the face of a scarily angry foul-breathed girl for all of three seconds before she is being punched square in the face, and her hands struggle in the other girl’s grip wildly. It’s too long before she’s able to take in a breath again from pure shock, and her entire face is now throbbing viciously.  _

_ “You wanna mouth off to me one more time? Just try me, you fucking cunt,” the girl snarls angrily before the other one behind Nicky yanks on her hair as hard as she can, pulling her head back so that she can talk in her ear.  _

_ “I wouldn’t test her, sweetheart. She has a temper about as nasty as the shit I took this morning.”  _

_ Nicky breaths through her mouth, attempting to steady herself.  _

_ Don’t break down, don’t break down, the voice insists urgently inside her head. You can’t let them know you’re in pain.  _

_ “Oh, really?” Nicky asks after a few more moments of catching her breath. “Well, that shit you took. . . Sounds about the most heavenly thing on God’s green earth right now compared to whoever’s dick she had to suck to smell that abominable.”  _

_ “That’s it, you’re fucking done,” the girl growls into her face, slapping her once again. Before Nicky can even register that she’s been hit, she’s being kicked in the stomach harder than any blow she’s ever felt in her life.  _

_ It’s funny how this part stands out so sharply, so starchly, against the rest that’s been but a blurred tint in her mind, colored red like the blood that dripped from her nose the moment she was punched.  _

_Alarm bells go off in Nicky’s head because she can’t fucking breathe, and these girls still have their hands on her. All she wants to do is to fight back, but she fucking_ can’t _because her arms are tied behind her back, literally not_ _allegorically, and all she can do is squirm in their grip because they’re stronger than her and more of them than her and she can’t. Fucking. Breathe._

_ She feels herself being pushed forward, and is finally,  _ finally _ able to gulp in a breath of fresh air, but before she can say anything, the other girl pulls her hair again.  _ Jesus, _ and she thought she had a hair-pulling kink.  _

_ “You’re so fucking dead,” she exclaims.  _

_ “Is that the-” Nicky gasps at the pain in her face just from speaking- “best you can do? Are you trying to scare me? Cause guys, let me tell ya, I’ve met God. Multiple times. The dude fucking loves me.”  _

_ Classic line, from a simpler time. Nicky wants to find a time machine and go back and start all over. Completely over. But right now she has more pressing matters to attend to. Like  _ not  _ dying on account of some stupid, homophobic bitches beating on her no matter how much God may or may not “love” her.  _

_ She hears laughter coming from the other girls. “Aw, that’s adorable. You wanna pay him a visit? Or did you guys have to redefine your relationship after he found out you get off on sucking pussy?”  _

_ Before Nicky can do or say anything, or even attempt to fight back, the girls are shoving her forward until her head crashes into the side of a bookshelf with a loud thump. Pain explodes all over her temples, and she hears herself cry out in agony as she falls slack in their arms. She hears more laughter, but it’s blurred now, almost like she’s underwater. Everything’s blurred. Her eyes slip closed as the tears she fought off from earlier finally begin to slide down her face. She doesn’t even know if the girls are still here, doesn’t care. All she can think about is how much her head hurts, how much everything hurts, until she feels a sharp pain in her lower abdomen. She’s being  _ kicked _. Again. Are they fucking kidding her?  _

_ Words slurred, she opens her eyes and exclaims with rage boiling in her chest, “This make you feel better about your own pathetic lives, you fucking pieces of shit?” She then attempts to sit up, only to be kicked on the side and have another explosion of pain erupt in her back.  _

_ “Burn in hell, bitch, and stay the fuck off our territory or we won’t be so nice next time,” the girl who kicked Nicky snears as she delivers one final kick to her head. After that, everything goes black.  _

 

______

 

Lorna holds her stomach carefully as she sits down across from Piper and Alex at the table with her breakfast tray, even though the idea of food is the farthest thing from her mind right now. She just went through yet another brutal, unforgiving round of morning sickness, and she feels a wave of nausea wash over her stomach as the most unpleasant stench of prison food reaches her nose. 

“Mornin, Chapman. Mornin, Vause,” she greets, though the usual air of cheeriness is noticeably absent from her tone. 

“Morning, Lorna,” Piper greets in response, looking her over. “How’re you holding up? You don’t look too good today.” 

“Yeah, I guess I’m just feeling a little under the weather this morning. Little Carmine here can’t seem to give me a break,” she says with a chuckle, trying to make light of the situation. 

“Have you tried asking for some pain medication?” Piper asks. 

“None of the guards I’ve tried want to take me to medical,” says Lorna with a sigh. “Half of ‘em don’t even believe I’m pregnant.” 

“That’s fucked,” Piper says. “I mean, we’re prisoners, but we still have rights.” 

“Oh, don’t start,” says Alex. 

“I mean, you’re  _ entitled  _ to a medical exam, and if anything you just need proof so that the guards can stop pushing you around before you start to show more,” Piper continues. 

“I know, but what else am I gonna do?” asks Lorna defeatedly. “I’ll just try to keep throwing up every morning until they catch on cause we’re on their time here, not ours.” 

“Lorna, I’m not gonna speak for everyone here, but personally I can’t stand to see you walking around in that much pain anymore,” Piper tells her. “I’ll even talk to a guard for you. I have experience charming them into giving me my way.” 

“Yeah, during your prison gang panty business days,” Alex chimes in, brushing her side affectionately. 

“Hey, you know in retrospect, before Maria got involved and I took things too far, that idea was pretty smart,” says Piper. “To think . . .” She stares off into space, desire laced in her voice. “How much more money I could’ve made if I’d just stayed small-scale. If I didn’t take things too far like I did with Piscatella. God, it’s like I completely lost sight of what I was actually working for.” 

“And then after the business fell down you made the smart choice to lay low with me and do the rest of your time quietly, and legally,” Alex adds with a smile. 

Piper hums in agreement. “And I have you. What more could I want?” That smile she saves just for Alex spreads wide across her face. 

“You guys are just too sweet. You’re makin me sick,” Lorna says. 

Alex chuckles. 

“Lorna, have you seen Nicky at all? She wasn’t at dinner last night,” Piper says, lacing her fingers with Alex’s on the table. 

Lorna looks at their interlaced hands and feels a lurch in her chest. That’s all she wants, is to feel that close to somebody, and find home in someone. She wonders if Vinnie will stay with her once the baby comes, because the hypotheticals of parenting and actually parenting are two very different things. Would he help her change diapers or feed and rock the baby, or would they fall into more traditional, old fashioned parenting roles where she would do all the cooking and cleaning while Vinnie goes and works and provides financially? Maybe they’ll get a dog. Does Vinnie like dogs? That’s something she needs to ask him. She also wonders if he would want to renew their vows once she gets out of prison, or if he’d be interested in saving up for a house. That’s another thing she needs to ask him during their next phone call, is about the housing market. Maybe they should- 

“Lorna?” 

She blinks back to reality to see a concerned Piper and Alex staring her down, and remembers that they asked her a question. She’s been getting lost like that a lot lately, and she’s worried that it’s only going to get worse. How many seconds in her life has she lost to her thoughts? 

“Sorry, guys. Kinda just spaced out there for a second. But now that you mention it, I don’t think I’ve seen her since yesterday before our lunch time. Last I talked to her, she was trying to help Florez get pregnant. I think Diaz was in on it, too. They used semen from her actual boyfriend, and I’m pretty sure Nicky said she has a way to plant it in her like an artificial insemination.” 

Alex’s face scrunches up in distaste, but Piper actually looks impressed. “Good for her. If Florez wants a kid, then that’s great. I applaud her.” 

“I’m starting to think these girls are maybe a little jealous of my pregnancy,” Lorna says, rubbing her belly mindfully. 

“Not everything is about you, Lorna,” Alex says. Then a look of sudden realization dawns upon her face, and she leans forward in her seat. “Wait, guys . . . Florez wasn’t at lunch yesterday, either. Did you see her at all last night, Piper?” 

Piper shakes her head. “No, I haven’t seen her since yesterday morning. Why?” 

“Because if Florez and Nicky were together yesterday and now they’re both missing, then something’s wrong,” says Alex. 

“Shit . . .” Piper turns to look at Lorna. “Maybe we should ask a guard.” 

“I don’t know where they’d be, what they’d be doing,” Lorna says. “What would’ve happened to ‘em?” 

Piper stands up from her seat and walks over to the nearest CO. Lorna and Alex watch her conversation from afar, unable to listen over the ruthless racket of the regular prison noise. 

“So I don’t know how to ask this without sounding offensive, but isn’t Florez kind of old to be trying to get pregnant?” Alex asks. 

“The women in my family all have natural extra long-lasting eggs,” Lorna replies. “They can get pregnant well into their thirties. Maybe Florez is the same way.” 

“I can’t imagine having a child in prison. I know it’s not like you have any say in the matter, but I still think what you’re doing is really brave,” Alex tells her earnestly. 

Lorna feels a warmth spread through her as she smiles at Alex’s compliment. “Thank you, Vause. You don’t know what that means to me. It’s no easy task, but trust me I’m doing the best I can with each day.” 

“You’re doing really fucking great, actually. I mean, we were kinda surprised, honestly- at how well you’re handling all of this,” Alex says. 

Lorna smiles softly and looks downward, cheeks tainted in a light coat of blush. She appreciates the praise, but Alex’s words still worry her. She wonders whether she’s been handling it so well just because she’s been distracted by the riot and the change in location and hasn’t had the time to really sit down and process it, or because she hasn’t truly accepted the reality of the situation, and she has no idea what she’s really in for. She doesn’t want to know the answer. 

“Guys,” Piper says, walking back hurriedly and sitting down next to Alex. “Guys, the CO told me that Nicky’s in medical. She and Florez got attacked yesterday.” 

Lorna feels a pang of alarm hit her chest, harder than she expected, and feels her thoughts rapidly begin to spin. What kind of attack was it? How was she injured? How serious is she hurt? Is she okay? Oh god, is she  _ conscious? _ She doesn’t think she’s ever felt this worried before, not even when she feared for the safety of her child during the riot, and that thought scares the absolute shit out of her. 

“What?” she exclaims, standing up. “Oh my god, is she okay, Chapman? What did they say happened?” 

“I don’t know, they didn’t say anything else. I tried asking, but all they told me was that Nicky was admitted yesterday with Florez after they were found in the library.” 

_ “Found?”  _ Lorna’s anxiety grips her chest even tighter, and she clenches her hands in distress. “Oh my god, I have to go see her, I have to make sure she’s okay-” 

“Hey, hey, Lorna, it’s okay. It’s going to be okay,” Piper soothes as she reaches out to place a hand on her arm, rubbing softly. “Whatever happened, it can’t be that bad or else they would’ve taken her to an actual hospital.” 

Lorna tries to slow her breathing, listening to Piper’s words, understanding. Her words make sense. That makes sense. If Nicky’s in medical and not in an actual hospital, then she’s at least okay enough to where her life isn’t in immediate danger. It settles her a little bit, very slightly. But it’s not enough to stop her worrying, and she knows that the only way to truly ease the rapid churning of her stomach is to go see Nicky herself. 

“That’s true. You’re right,” she says, placing a hand on top of hers. “But I still gotta go see her, cause I need to make sure she’s okay.” Before Piper or Alex can protest, Lorna stands up once again and takes her untouched tray to the trash before going to approach a CO. 

She tries the tall, big ginger-haired one. Lorna sees the way she talks to the girls. She thinks she may have a shot at getting to see Nicky if she asks nicely enough. 

“Hey, um, excuse me, officer?” she asks, trying her best to sound as polite as possible despite the quivering she feels in her voice. 

“Morning, Morello,” the guard says cheerfully, greeting her with a grin. Lorna’s almost positive it’s fake. But she can work with fake. She can work with sweet-talking a guard into giving her what she wants. What she can’t work with is attempting to reason with the pure evil and malice that most of the guards carry around with them all the time here. 

“Good morning! Um, I was actually wondering if I could pay a visit to my friend in medical? I think she’s really hurt, and I’ve been real worried about her. Would it be alright if I saw her for just a couple minutes? I wouldn’t take long,” she says, as kindly and gently as she possibly can without sounding too aggravated. She has no problem sounding genuine, because the worry she has for Nicky right now couldn’t be more real if she tried. 

The guard’s face almost seems to light up with interest, and her eyes widen in what appears to be the slightest hint of excitement. “Which inmate, what’s her name?” she asks, completely ignoring Lorna’s request. Lorna, completely taken aback and now brimming with anxiety and confusion, stutters out, “U-Uh, her name is N-Nicky, Nicky Nichols.” 

The guard’s face immediately falls again. “Nichols? Damn it . . .” Her brows furrow and her lips form into a frown. Now Lorna’s even more confused. 

“Yeah . . . Would it be alright if you could take me to go see her?” Lorna tries asking again. 

The guard gazes off in thought, unfocused, still not answering Lorna. 

“Excuse me-”

“What does this look like to you, a fucking Utica walk-in waiting room?” The guard looks incredibly annoyed now, and almost disappointed? Lorna has no idea what she could have said or done to piss her off this much. 

“I can’t go giving you special treatment just because your friend took a couple of shivs to the ribs,” the guard continues. “It looks bad on me.” 

Lorna’s heart races with fear. “S-She was shivved?” 

“Oh, I have no idea. I was just making an example,” she says passively. 

Relief washes over Lorna like a wave. She grabs her heart. “You can’t be doing that to me. Bursts of stress like that are not good for my baby,” she says.

The guard’s face softens. “You’re having a baby? I had no idea. I’m sorry I scared ya there. Should’ve been more sensitive.” 

Lorna doesn’t want to sit here and chat about her baby. She wants to,  _ needs _ to see Nicky, to hold her hand and stroke her hair and make sure she’s okay. The longer she pictures Nicky lying in a bed in pain the more upset she becomes, and the heavier her chest weighs down on her. She feels tears brimming at the edge of her eyes because all of this is too much for her to handle right now. 

_ Wait.  _ She can play this off to her advantage right now. This might be her only shot. 

Lorna sniffles, a little more loudly than she normally would have for dramatic effect, and wipes her eye as if she anticipates a tear falling. “It’s okay, I’m just, ya know, real worried about my friend. And I don’t know if she’s okay or not cause she got hurt real bad. All I know is that she was taken in last night, unconscious, and I just want to see and make sure that she’s alright, that she’s still breathing and that she’s still all there in the head. You know, cause she could’ve gotten a head injury. Oh god, I hope it’s not serious.” 

She sniffles again, and without any added effort she feels two tears slip swiftly down her cheeks. 

The guard looks concerned, and very uncomfortable at having to witness Lorna melt down.  _ Don’t worry, _ Lorna silently reassures her.  _ This’ll be the first of many.  _ Since she can’t seem to keep her shit together for longer than two seconds nowadays. 

“Ah, shit . . . Alright, look, I’ll take you to see your friend, okay? Just don’t tell anybody, and ten minutes is all you get. Come on, Morello, before I change my mind.” 

Lorna’s face breaks out into a big smile, and her entire body practically sags with relief. “Really? Oh, thank you, thank you so much,” she says, wiping the tears from her face. 

The guard just sighs with a roll of her eyes and gestures for Lorna to follow her, which she most gratefully does. 

____

 

Nicky presses the ice pack as gently to her forehead as possible, groaning in pain from the mere touch of the material. She sighs just to feel even more pain in her ribs and lower abdomen. Fucking great, even breathing is painful. She wants to call in the nurse and ask for as many sleeping pills as possible so she can sleep off this giant monster of a headache and these daggers in her sides as long as she can until she can wake up not without her entire body screaming head to toe, but she knows that solution would only work in a perfect world.

And in a perfect world Nicky wouldn’t have gotten beat up by some homophobic assholes in the first place. In a perfect world, Nicky wouldn’t have gotten addicted to heroin or wound up in prison at all because she would have had people who actually loved her and cared about her. She wouldn’t have been such a failure, a burnout and a waste of space, and a burden on everyone she knew. 

But before she can wallow in her own self-pity any longer, a nurse approaches her bed with a cup of water and couple of pills. 

“Here’s some water, you should hydrate. And these’ll help with the pain.” 

Nicky glances down at the pills and then back up the nurse, pursing her lips. 

“I might need something a little stronger to kill this headache, cause trust me. I’m no stranger to opioids,” she tells the nurse, trying to sound light. But it comes out cracked. And broken. And wrong. 

Exasperated, the nurse sighs and shakes her head. “This is all we have. Take these, and if you’re still in pain in an hour I’ll give you some more.” She then walks away without another word. 

Nicky’s eyes widen momentarily as she rubs her temples to try and soothe her headache. “Alright,” she says to herself, knocking both the pills back in one go and gulping down some water afterwards. “Some five star service we got going on here.” 

She closes her eyes and sinks back into her pillow, hoping that maybe she can find a way to get some sleep in spite of the fact that she can’t sleep on her back nor move to her side because lying on either side causes too much pain in her ribs. She’s too tightly wound up with  _ anger _ at having been treated so fucking unfairly to even consider sleeping for a while, and she realizes that the only reason she’s here in the first place is because she still can’t learn to shut her big, fat mouth. She always takes things too far, and she doesn’t know how to stop. She doesn’t think she could even if she did know. 

Before she can even attempt to drift off to sleep, she hears a voice calling her name. 

“Nicky?” 

Wait . . . There’s no way. Is she hallucinating? Nicky truly worries she’s losing it, and decides that next time the nurse comes back she’ll ask to be tested for a concussion. 

Nicky opens her eyes, and sure enough, Lorna Morello, real and in the flesh, is running towards her at full speed with the tall, ginger-haired CO shortly behind in tow, and she’s not dreaming, this is real life, Lorna is actually here. 

“Oh my god, Nicky!” Lorna cries, sounding far more distressed and worried for her than Nicky likes. Lorna kneels down in front of her and reaches out for her face, delicately cupping the side of her jaw. 

“Baby, what happened to you?” she asks desperately, sounding so  _ scared  _ and so  _ worried. _ Shit, does Nicky really look that bad? The idea’s easier for her to process than the idea that Lorna’s this worried about her regardless of how she looks. 

She can’t respond because as good as Lorna’s touch makes her feel, as much as it fills her up with the most wonderful kind of warmth, her face is still in too much pain for her to be able to handle any human contact right now. She flinches under Lorna’s touch and feels a wave of shame wash over her as Lorna draws her hand away with even more concern furrowing in her brow. 

“What’s wrong, love? Where does it hurt?” 

Nicky doesn’t know how to handle Lorna being this gentle with her, this kind and loving to her. She  _ can’t. _ Her entire body tenses up because she’s in so much  _ fucking _ pain she can’t even enjoy being in Lorna’s company, and Lorna’s so stressed when Nicky never wants her to be stressed over her. About anything. Lorna has a baby on the way, and here she is putting its health at risk for Nicky not being able to keep her mouth shut for five goddamn minutes. 

“Pretty much everywhere,” she responds, voice breaking. 

Lorna scoots closer to her. “What’d they do to you, baby? Tell me.” She reaches for Nicky again and this time ever so softly strokes her hair, tucking one stray curl to the side. 

Nicky draws in a breath and releases it shakily. She doesn’t know how to handle being touched so intimately by someone she cares for so much. She closes her eyes for just a moment and allows herself to enjoy the comforting gestures and gentle motions coming from the person she loves most, the only person she’s ever loved like this, ever will. Lorna’s truly the only person that’s ever had this much of an effect on her, and it terrifies Nicky to think about how much power Lorna actually has over her. And she doesn’t even know it. 

“It was just a couple of shit stains from C-block that saw me and Florez in the library when I was trying to get her pregnant, and got completely the wrong idea. Well, sorta the wrong idea. I did paint myself a pretty incriminating picture,” she says. 

Lorna tucks one final strand of hair behind Nicky’s ear before withdrawing her hand. “Did they hit you?” she asks. 

Nicky’s heart skips a beat. “A few times. Got a couple kicks in, too. The real icing on the cake though was when they threw me into a bookshelf, headfirst. I’m telling you _ that _ was the star the show. They hate homoerotic behavior even more than Pence, and that is fucking saying something.” 

Lorna’s eyes widen, and she gasps as covers her mouth with her hand. 

“Nicky, that’s . . . That’s a hate crime. They-they can’t do that, they can’t get away with that. Look at you, they could’ve cracked your head open or punctured your lung if they’d gone any further.” 

Nicky’s heart lurches. She feels like she’s under a microscope, and she hates seeing Lorna this distressed over her. She feels like she’s let her down, again. 

“Who were they?” Lorna presses on, anger rising in her tone. “We’re gonna find those bitches and fucking turn them in. We can’t let them get away with this.” 

Nicky shakes her head. “Baby . . . We don’t have a choice. We can’t prove it was them, and even if we did we can’t fight fire with fire this time. They’d come back bloodthirsty for more, and this time they’d do more than just me. They’d hurt more of us, baby, they could hurt  _ you.” _

“I hate seein’ you like this, Nik. But I’m really glad you’re okay,” Lorna tells her softly. 

“I don’t want you worrying about me too much, kid,” says Nicky, looking her straight in her beautiful brown eyes. She sits up more in her bed, in spite of the shooting pain in her ribs, and reaches her arm out for Lorna to take. Lorna grasps her hand and rubs soft circles on her palm, gently stroking her lower arm. All it takes is a few seconds under Lorna’s tender touch for Nicky to relax more into her bed, sighing contentedly. 

“Don’t wanna scare you. Or stress you out about anything. It’s not good for you or the baby,” Nicky says quietly, focusing her gaze downward because this conversation is too hard to have with Lorna’s eyes. 

Out of the corner of her eye she sees Lorna shaking her head, and the grip on Nicky’s hand tightens. 

“I was worried because you’re important to me, and I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you. I didn’t know how hurt you were, Nicky, you could’ve been braindead for all I knew. I had to make sure you were safe.”

Lorna’s words have more of an effect on Nicky than she could have possibly anticipated, and they have her stomach doing all sorts of flips and acrobatic tricks. Her heart pounds heavily against her chest, and she doesn’t know what Lorna can read off from her expression right now. All she knows is that Lorna took her by complete surprise and Nicky didn’t have time to put up her walls, to drill her defenses, to any degree that she needs them to be performing at right now. 

They aren’t even undressed and never has Nicky ever felt so naked in front of her before. 

“Yeah, they may have fucked up my head a little bit,” she says, still in a trance and still awestruck at Lorna. She can’t even  _ think _ straight right now. “But I’m okay.” 

“Nicky . . .” Lorna sighs, lacing their hands together. “I was really scared for you. I felt sick, like it was worse than all my other morning sickness. Don’t do that to me again, okay? We need you to stick around.” 

Nicky feels that same warmth begin to spread through her again, the same kind of warmth she gets when Red cares for her, but somehow . . . Better. This is a different kind of love. She selfishly decides she can worry about Vinnie and all Lorna’s marriage and baby fantasies later. She reasons she has the rest of her sentence to deal with Lorna’s inconsistency, so just for now she takes the love and affection Lorna’s giving her without any complaint nor question. 

“Don’t worry, kid. I promise.” She takes Lorna’s hand in hers and brings it up to her lips, kissing it gently. “I’m not going anywhere.”

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I needed this in the show so badly, so when someone sent me a prompt about this my fingers could literally not type the words fast enough. This fic wrote itself, and I hope in season 7 we get some more much deserved long overdue, REAL, IMPORTANT, nichorello scenes. my babies deserve way more. But for now, I'm just going to write the pain away, so expect more nicky/lorna fics real soon guys:) Thanks for reading, and as always feel free to leave feedback below and check out my tumblr lydiastiiles between updates


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